


Reflection

by DrSteggy



Series: Uneasy Lies the Chosen of Farore side fics [8]
Category: The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/M, Short & Sweet, zelink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-19
Updated: 2021-02-19
Packaged: 2021-03-14 23:36:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29550114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DrSteggy/pseuds/DrSteggy
Summary: Middle aged Zelda reflects
Relationships: Link/Zelda (Legend of Zelda)
Series: Uneasy Lies the Chosen of Farore side fics [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1689868
Comments: 10
Kudos: 34





	Reflection

**Author's Note:**

> Fic for February

The Hero of Hyrule snored. Like a moblin.

Zelda laid on her side, hands tucked under her cheek, listening to him, watching him sleep. His hair was a ruffled mess. She reached out to gently tuck a few strands behind his ear. She ran her thumb along the edge of his ear, tip to the enameled blue hoop piercing the lobe. He shifted under her touch and she pulled away until he settled again with a deep snuffle.

Zelda propped herself up on her elbow. His mouth dropped open a little and his breath rattled. 

_How does he sleep through that_ , she wondered.

It had been a long, strange year and change for both of them. She had not known what to expect from the middle aged man who unexpectedly drew the master sword from its pedestal. She had not been impressed by him. _At all._ He was short. He looked tired and mortified. He looked completely overwhelmed. She hadn’t realized she had an image in her head of what the Chosen of Farore should look like, and this wasn’t it. She had nearly burst into tears telling Impa about it later.

And now here he was sleeping in her bed. 

She brushed her fingers across his cheek.

The first thing he asked for was a leave of absence, where he had run home and then off to some dead romance. He had a lot of dead romances. His past partners had been impressive in both numbers and by how many seemed indifferent after. There were some exceptions--the woman from his home had smiled recalling their teenaged fumbling together, a Gerudo guard who had asked excitedly after him, the one in Lurelin who might have happily murdered him if given the chance--but he didn’t seem to leave many deeper impressions, not ones that lasted. He floated through his own life.

He had come back, though. 

And he had gone out to try and play this role that had been thrust on him. She began to harbor some hope that perhaps he could be reforged into a useful tool. She decided to see him as a thing she needed to keep her kingdom safe. It was easier than seeing him as an actual person.

Then he went out and got himself killed.

Fate and fairy magic brought him back, of course, and shattered him in doing it. Her heart broke a little when he had sent the letter asking for help. She doubted he had ever asked for help in his entire life, not in the way his missive implied. She sent Impa off to the Zora Domain to collect him. Impa brought him back, physically in one piece, but she was grim about the state of his mind.

“He is pretty stuck in his head,” Impa reported. “I gave him some ways to cope with it, but he can’t do this himself, though it seems like that is what he is going to try.”

Zelda tried to help. It took weeks, but she eventually convinced him to come to her parlor where he sat, obviously uncomfortable and reluctant to talk. Finally, she reached out to touch his shoulder and asked him what happened. He tried to tell her. He did. And he broke in front of her. She was so moved that she took him in her arms to let him cry it out. He reminded her so much of her boys when they were small and had a skinned knee or a bee sting. He clung to her like he was drowning, and she stroked his hair, just like she had with her boys.

It didn’t feel awkward until he quieted. Then he suddenly reared back, and she was face to face with him. She was struck by how blue his eyes were and she caught him drop his gaze to her mouth and then he pushed back, blushing to the tips of his ears. She turned away, feeling warm and fluttery, unsure and unstable and he dismissed himself. Once he was gone, she buried her face in her hands, wondering what had just happened. _Why was he looking at her lips?_

What had happened indeed. She smiled at his dozing form. He looked at peace, even as he drooled on the pillow.

He asked her out to see the stars, right before they entered the desert. She thought he was just trying to be friendly, still. When he tentatively placed his hand over hers, though, she tangled her fingers in his, holding her breath as her heart skipped. She turned to him then, to find him looking away, suddenly shy. The moon silvered his hair and played gently with the contours of his face. It wasn’t fair, she thought, that the world would insist she be endlessly linked to someone else and then make him so pretty.

He finally turned to look at her, and leaned in to her, stopping tantalizingly close. She closed some of the distance herself, but then brought her lips to his ear to whisper to him instead. She thought about kissing him that night, by the three, had she thought about it. She went to bed wondering how that tongue of his would feel against hers and if he would be a little rough compared to what she knew. But he gave her the option, and she decided to not take it.

He wasn’t ready for her. Not really. Below his surface he was still a wreck. A lovely, glorious wreck that would be enjoyable and fascinating to explore but ultimately it would end with everyone getting hurt, and she could not afford that luxury. Not with so much at stake. She pulled herself back. She had been alone for a long time now. Longer would not matter.

He wasn’t ready. He might never be. 

It hurt to watch him pull himself away from her. He had come back from the Arbiter’s Grounds injured and furious, and it hurt to see him struggle so much. He said things in anger he didn’t mean, pulled himself away and eschewed any offers of help.

Until he turned to Impa. 

Zelda had known Impa a decade, at least, and the Shiekah woman went beyond her official role of advisor. Zelda had still been raw and grieving her husband when Impa took her assignment. Impa became a soft place for her to turn as she tried to heal.

She still felt a little misty thinking of him, though she thought he would approve of Link as a successor. 

_Ah, Dozam, I still miss you. What would you think of all this?_

Link and Impa’s friendship had been as heartwarming for her as it was surprising. He seemed to meet her as an equal, and they spent at least as much time crossing swords as they did talking. She was good for him, Zelda thought, and taught him things he didn’t know he needed. Perhaps she had given Link a soft, safe place to fall, too. She pulled him past his fury and frustrations, at least, and opened him to thinking of himself differently.

After he learned to be friends with Impa, it seemed he could be friends with Zelda. He tried. He was still rough on the edges, and tended to just blurt out whatever came to his mind. It could be tough to hear what he had to say sometimes. He had a tumultuous past, though he didn’t seem to see it. Talking to him could be like riding out a storm.

She didn’t recall when she started to wonder what he might be like to kiss, or how he might touch her, though she never let on that she thought about such things to him or to Impa. Until he had asked her if she was still his Zelda, his voice low and husky. She fell immediately under the press of his lips, the heat of his mouth waking some part of her. It had been so long since anyone had kissed her like that. 

When he broke for a breath she chased him herself. It was over and she was done. Everything else was just a matter of time.

He tilted his head back and sounded more bokoblin than moblin. The rising sun had hit the window in her bedroom and spilled across him, turning his hair back to the shade of gold it probably was twenty years earlier. She ran her fingers over his collarbone, to his bicep. His eyes fluttered open and he lazily smiled at her.

“Good morning, your majesty.”

She smiled back at him. “Good morning, hero.”

“Snuggle?” It’s an invitation and a demand. She pressed up against him and he folded his arms around her, settling his cheek on her neck with a soft sigh.

It had been a long, strange year, and they were both changed by it. He was no longer the overwhelmed, lost soul who had been thrust into her life. 

“Has anyone ever told you you snore?”

“I’ve been told, yes. Is it a problem?”

“What if I said it was?”

“Then it’s your problem now.” He made a loud faux snore sound, practically in her ear. She pushed him back with a giggle. He wore a wounded expression a moment before returning the laugh. She let him pull her back in and he settled deeper into the pillows.

“We can just stay like this, for a bit?” He asked. “It’s nice.”

“As long as you want.” She combed her fingers through his hair.

“Good.” He pulled her in a little closer and she let herself melt into him. 

**Author's Note:**

> I’ve thought about rewriting some of the long fic from Zelda’s point of view. I’m not sure I’ll do more than this, as at some point I should branch out from this AU, but it still suits me, so...


End file.
